Which buildings need an energy certificate — and the gaps

In a portfolio the question is rarely whether one particular building needs an energy performance certificate (energideklaration) — it is whether you know which of your buildings do. The duty applies per building, there are seven exemptions, and a property register does not answer the question because it lists properties, not buildings.

The most common defect in a portfolio is therefore not an expired certificate but a building that never made it onto the list of buildings that should have one.

When a certificate is required

• Buildings where a right of use has been granted — anything let or held under a co-operative right.
• Buildings over 250 square metres frequently visited by the public.
• On sale of a building or a share in a building. See energy certificates when selling.
• New buildings, where the certificate must be produced after the building is taken into use.

The certificate is then valid for ten years from the date it was issued — see requirements and validity.

The seven exemptions

Ordinance (2006:1592) on energy performance certificates for buildings exempts the following:

1. Buildings used mainly for worship or religious activity.
2. Industrial plants and workshops.
3. Residential buildings used for less than four months a year, or for a limited part of the year where energy use is below a quarter of full-year consumption.
4. Temporary buildings intended for use for no more than two years.
5. Agricultural buildings with low energy demand in farming or forestry.
6. Detached buildings with a total useful floor area under 50 square metres.
7. Buildings intended for national defence that are secret in nature.

Point six is the one most often in play in a residential portfolio — storage buildings, garages and waste houses regularly fall out, but only if they are detached and under 50 square metres. A larger garage in its own building does not.

Point two is the one most often misapplied. The exemption covers industrial plants and workshops, not an office section or a retail unit in an otherwise let building.

Calculating coverage

The measure is simple, but only if the denominator is right:

Coverage = buildings with a valid certificate ÷ buildings covered by the requirement

Four steps that generally need doing in order:

1. List the buildings, not the properties. A property can have one building or thirty. See building or property.
2. Remove the exempt ones per the list above, and write down why — otherwise the judgement is remade every time.
3. Match certificates to buildings. This is where the work is, because certificates are identified in practice by address while portfolios are managed by property designation.
4. Split the result into three piles: valid, expired, missing entirely.

The third pile is the important one and the hardest to produce. An expired certificate is visible — it has a date. A building that has never been certified has nothing to sort on and exists only as an absence.

Is one certificate per property enough?

No. The duty attaches to the building. A property with six apartment blocks needs six certificates with six different validity dates, and it is entirely normal for four to be valid, one expired and one missing. See building or property for why the confusion is so common.

Who supervises

Boverket is the supervisory authority under Ordinance (2006:1592), not the municipal building committee — which distinguishes the energy certificate from ventilation control, where the building committee supervises. Boverket can order the owner to comply and couple the order with a financial penalty. See when the certificate is missing.

Certificates are registered with Boverket, which also makes them searchable. It is the only one of the property owner's inspections with a national register to reconcile against — ventilation control has no equivalent, see national register.

What Emphyx does here

This is the core of the product. We read in the energy certificates, extract the data from the PDFs, link each certificate to the right building, and show in regulatory compliance which buildings have a valid certificate, which have an expired one and which have none — including certificates whose address could not be matched to any known building, otherwise the quietest source of error in a portfolio.

We do not produce certificates. That is done by a certified energy expert, and the recommendations in the certificate are theirs — see the recommendations.